Do You Blame Me?
by chocolate covered hot chilies
Summary: One shot into the life of Callie & Arizona after the 'camera stops rolling'. 8x12-It is through our own eyes that we recognize our faults through the ill actions of other people but does that ever solve anything?


_I am disclaiming any of my own originality in the characters herein from Grey's Anatomy. I am not now nor ever planning on profiting off the work of others by using said characters from Grey's Anatomy. Wouldn't that make me a pimp if I used somebody else's skills to make profit? I'd make a sexy pimp but I'm sure I'd disappoint my mother terribly if I decided to take up that profession._

_A/N_: It seems as if everybody leaves a small message for their readers so I'll make mine short and sweet. Most of the work will be considered of M-nature but for the first posting, I've decided to air on the side of caution and go with something less risque. I hope you enjoy the story and feedback is always welcome in any form. If you're too shy to leave a review, I see nothing wrong with that but please do drop me a PM if you'd like to talk shop. I say good day sir.

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><p>Zola's birthday party turned 10,000th surgery celebration for Richard Webber turned Owen's violent breakdown had been weighing on the brunette's mind all evening. Add that to the whirlwind of emotions already plaguing her and to say she'd been uncharacteristically quiet all night was understatement. Callie couldn't turn her mind off no matter how hard she tried and as she sat next to her wife in bed pretending to read the book in her hand, even Arizona was picking up on the drastic change of moods in her wife.<p>

"Wanna talk about it?" Finally breaking the silence, Arizona put down her medical journal to turn and face her wife.

"Yes and no." Callie put down her own book but didn't dare turn to face her wife; she was a mess of emotions and knew that Arizona would be able to read each and every one of them.

"Let's go with yes than." Arizona had been waiting for Callie to sort through her feelings from the events of the night. Owen's outburst had gotten to Arizona too but for different reasons; she'd seen him over the past few months slowly spiraling out of control but her concern lay solely for the patients he would treat in his unstable state of mind. Although never terribly close to Cristina, Arizona knew the young cardio surgeon was able to take care of herself and between Teddy and Meredith, she would be okay. It's not that Arizona didn't feel bad for the younger woman but her and Callie were finally in a good place and she didn't want to rock the boat by getting involved in what was only going to blow up to be a war.

"I'm Owen, aren't I?" She whispered her concern, afraid of the response she would get in return.

"What? No, Callie. You aren't Owen." This was not the place Arizona thought her wife was going to go with all the events that what went down this evening. She figured there'd be a healthy bit of worry over her exroommate but this - this was very unexpected.

"I am. I forced you to have children when you didn't want to." Callie wiped the stray tears off her cheeks before they encourage more.

"Callie-" Arizona really didn't see this coming.

"No, I get that you said that you changed your mind but you only changed your mind in order to not lose me, Arizona. We were both very vulnerable after the shootings and when things calmed down, I saw that. I realized that and I became okay with the brash decision you made but I wasn't planning to keep you to it. I just- I needed you in my life and I wasn't going to make you do something, make you have a family that you didn't want. I rationalized that I'd be the cool Tia that all my god-kids, nieces, and nephews loved best; the one that bought them all the awesome toys and they'd beg to spend their summers with me. I wasn't going to lose you again." Callie still couldn't turn to look at her wife; she was ashamed of herself and her actions. She couldn't bear the thought of seeing the same emotion reflected back in her blue eyes staring deeply at her.

"Callie-" Arizona kept trying to get a word in but her wife only continued to cut her off.

"And then I got pregnant and I knew I didn't want to do it without you. I didn't want the white-picket fence and two-car garage if it wasn't your car next to mine. I didn't even let you weigh it out, I didn't give you a choice; I bullied you into this. I might not have been as awful as Owen but I used your emotions against you. I didn't mean to, I didn't sit around and calculate the best way to manipulate you into doing it my way but I did still do it and I'm no better than the man that called his wife a murderer tonight. He married her knowing she never wanted to be a mother and he still thought he could change her. I changed you." Her thoughts were assaulting her common sense, her fears were taking control of rational thought, and Callie couldn't see the big picture.

"Callie-" This was a lot for Arizona to take in; yes, she never wanted to be a mother but now she couldn't imagine it any other way. Okay, maybe a few other ways but she could never imagine a life without Sofia, a life without Callie.

"Owen cracked tonight. He cracked because he realized he wasn't getting his dreams. How long until you do? Every day you are confronted with the ghosts of my past, how long until their haunting is too much for you?" The tears returned and Callie sobbed into her hands as her emotions finally broke free.

"Callie, that's not true. None of that is true. When I agreed to motherhood with you, I made that decision because I couldn't bear the thought of losing you again. I had the choice to walk away again but I'd already done that once and see how good that turned out? I love you." Arizona tried to joke but it did little to console her wife. "Callie, please stop crying. You are not Owen and I'm not going to crack just because I signed on for a lifetime job that wasn't originally in my dream. This is a better dream; one that I love very much and wouldn't have it any other way." Arizona pleaded with her wife to listen to her.

"Why are you being so enthusiastic about Julia?" This wasn't a jealousy issue for the brunette as some of Arizona's friendships in the past had brought about. Callie was deeply concerned for completely different reasons.

"What does Julia have to do with Owen?" The change of subject brought on a certain amount of confusion for Arizona. Did Callie think Arizona had a crush on Mark's girlfriend?

"Let me put it another way; what is Mark to you? Are you friends?" Callie knew she was all over the map but her emotions weren't giving her a break; she needed to put it all out on the table.

"I'd like to think we are; we _do_ share a daughter." Even almost a year later, the words still stung a small amount to speak aloud but Arizona had learned to deal with the pain of events that brought them here. Her wife had slept with Mark and gotten pregnant but Arizona had walked away from Callie and never promised she'd return nor gave her any reason to believe she was ever going to. When she got on the plane, she never planned on returning so why should she hold Callie accountable for how she dealt with what she assumed was the end of them?

"Yes, you share a daughter but are you saying your love of Julia apart from what might be an actual friendship, has nothing to do with anything but you find her a suitable companion for Mark and possible future parent of our daughter?" Callie was bearing her heart here and needed her wife to do the same. They'd gotten this far in working on their communication skills although they were still lacking, they needed to talk this out in order to keep forward on that path.

"Callie, I'm not sure where you are going with this." The turn of events and Callie's grief over the matter were concerning Arizona and she didn't like where it was going.

"You pushing Mark to embrace his relationship with Julia only has to do with the fact that you've grown to tolerate him and only want to see him happy because you share a child with him and nothing else?" Callie kept pushing, she didn't want to put words into her wife's mouth if they weren't true but by Arizona's actions alone, Callie knew it was anyway.

"Yes because we share a child together, Callie. What more do you want me to say?" A small amount of panic mixed with anger began making itself known and the blonde was starting to fidget. Her wife had finally turned to face her and on Callie's face was real concern.

"I want you to tell me why it's so important to you for Mark to tell Julia he loves her back. We both know Mark is my best friend and all I want is him happy, as happy as I am but you don't have that history with Mark. I watch you when he comes to pick up Sofia or he's over here playing with her and the look on your face is just sadness. I know when you said forever to me, you had to say forever to Mark too, and I can't change that. I can't make that look of defeat disappear from your eyes no matter what I do. So is this just because you share a child with Mark?" Callie was the one pleading now; if Arizona didn't tell her the truth, she couldn't help fix it. She needed to fix it.

"And a wife. I share a wife with him." There was no anger in her voice, just the sadness that Callie knew she had unintentionally put there. "If Mark and Julia found happiness, it'd be one less thing on my plate to worry about, okay? I can't help it, I know you aren't going to go running back to him but I'd like him to stop running back to you. Lexie isn't his comfort zone, you are. It's you that unconditionally loves him and he knows it. I know it's not the same type of love you have for me but it's unsettling. I'm jealous and selfish because I want all your love for me. So maybe I'm over enthusiastic when it comes to Julia but can you blame me?"

"Arizona, no. No, I can't blame you. Do you blame me?" Callie wasn't sure she could handle the answer, at least not tonight after seeing so much of herself in Owen but she needed it anyway. "Do you blame me for making this your life?"

"I do. I hold you accountable for every ounce of my happiness, Calliope. And I am happy. No, it's not easy but I know it's not easy for you either but that's marriage. You aren't Owen, you didn't trap me into a family, and I am happy. There's a difference between Cristina and me; your love for me showed me that I'd do anything to keep you and make you happy because that'd make me happy. I'm not saying that Cristina doesn't love Owen and wouldn't do what she could to make him happy but children would not make her happy and in reality, I'm not sure anything could make Owen happy anyway. Owen is abusive and angry; even on your worst day he isn't one tenth the person you are and Cristina deserves better." Arizona wiped at the tears on her wife's cheeks hoping she was getting through to her. Maybe Callie had hit the nail on the head with why she was so eager to make Mark and Julia the happy couple but she was so far off base with comparing herself to Owen and that upset Arizona greatly.

"Why did you say yes?" Callie wasn't so sure she wasn't that far from who Owen was; she still saw too much of them in the other couple and it scared her.

"I won't lie and say that little dare in the elevator didn't put things in perspective. Honestly if it weren't for that, I probably would have said some awful things and taken time to cool off and think things through afterward since I tend to jump the gun." Arizona swatted her wife's arm as Callie snickered at her. "Okay, I often jump the gun. But there I was lecturing you on forgiveness and there you were begging me for your own. You were daring me to follow through on my own words and love you still. We both made some pretty big - life decisions without the other's input but in that moment I knew I couldn't walk away again. I couldn't leave you again, pregnant or not. Maybe we should have talked more about what happened that got us to Africa or in your case, what got you in Mark's bed but life was going full speed ahead with or without us and we had to figure out how to keep up. We left things unsaid but they are better off being left unsaid because I love you and you love me and we got through it together and we always will." The tears had ceased to fall from the mocha eyes staring at her with love but still laced with a bit of fear.

"You aren't Owen, Callie, and neither am I. I love you. I love Sofia. I even love Mark and I really like Julia. Maybe I'm not giving you enough credit where Mark's concerned and that's my fault but you and I, we are good. If this marriage doesn't work out, it's not going to be because of our past or even Mark, okay?" Arizona pulled Callie in close until their foreheads were resting on each other. "We are good." She leaned in further to kiss her wife's salty lips, proving that even bringing up painful and hard subjects they could still be intimately together without using it as a bandage afterward. They could talk out the roughest of times and still capture the passion brewing inside each of them.

"You know Julia is a lot like you. Maybe it's you that Mark has a thing for and I'm just his consolation prize?" Callie teased pulling her wife on top of her; relief flooded her whole body on contact.

"We are not alike." Arizona bit down on her wife's bottom lip eliciting a rush of heat to both their cores.

"You both are comparatively perky." Callie moaned as slender fingers fought to rid tanned legs of clothing.

"I'll give you perky." Arizona abandoned her disrobing efforts and scooted down to latch onto her wife's nipple through the thin camisole barrier; nipping and sucking until both nipples were to the reaction of perky.

"Mmm, I don't mind that perky either." Callie slid the remaining garment from her legs using her feet and went to work on her wife's panties only to find nothing under the over-sized tee shirt Arizona was wearing. "Somebody came prepared."

"You don't go to the party without a present for the hostess, Callie. Didn't your mom ever teach you that?" The blonde leaned up pulling her shirt over her head before doing the same to her wife's remaining piece of clothing. When their naked bodies connected, both women moaned in appreciation of the wet heat mingling together between their legs.

"I'm not sure my mom meant that kind of present for the hostess but I'm not complaining; I'm not complaining at all." Callie pulled her wife in close; breasts against breasts, heat against heat they moved against each other working up to a slow and intense release. As they both reached their climax, emptying themselves of the stress and grief of the evening, the guilt Callie had been carrying for months; the guilt shoved down her throat by a vicious redheaded man with no soul, drained completely from her mind. They were just Callie and Arizona and nobody would ever make them less.


End file.
